The other day, I received a call out of the blue. The person on the other end of the line had heard from their customs broker that prices were going up because GSP expired. They did some google searches and came across my number.

We chatted for a bit and I learned that the company, based in New Jersey, imports presses and other metal fabricating machinery from Turkey. GSP reduced their import costs by 4.4 percent for the machinery and 4.7 percent for spare parts. The company is small, only six employees, but has plans to expand their facility in Illinois and hire four to five additional workers because of strong demand.

Being unfamiliar with the company or the product, I asked what that would mean for business. To paraphrase, he said: “I’m not sure we can maintain our current level of sales at those prices, so we’ll probably hold off on expansion until this gets cleared up.”
I sent an email thanking him for his call and then decided to start this blog. GSP’s expiration hurts. Loss of trade preferences makes profitable companies go into the red and it prevents thriving companies from expanding and hiring new workers.

Note: Since the company hasn’t given me permission to use its name, I made the post generic. If that changes, I’ll edit the post to provide the name and locations.